


The Other Side of Paradise

by Oripoke



Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe, Cyberpunk, Gen, Hacker!Tuuri, Heist, Illustrated, Mutant!Lalli, Psychic Abilities, Sci-Fi, Solarpunk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:55:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21981286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oripoke/pseuds/Oripoke
Summary: The mission seemed straightforward at first: break into the Västerström Corporation and steal the encryption key. With Lalli's unique set of skills, and Tuuri's guidance, they were more than up to the challenge. But what they discover behind locked doors might make matters a lot more complicated...
Comments: 11
Kudos: 37





	The Other Side of Paradise

**Author's Note:**

> Gift fic for Noodles on the SSSS forums, for Secret SSSSanta 2019!  
> I heard "Cyberpunk/Solarpunk feat. Lalli" and this AU story sprang out of it.  
> Mostly Gen (Emillalli if you squint). 
> 
> Title comes from [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMPX_vgqQnM) by Glass Animals.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

A slim figure crouches on top of a skyscraper, surveying the view from the tower's edge. It's nighttime, but darkness never truly falls in this city. The red-rose glow of the recently-set star paints one half of the sky, while the other half is illuminated with myriad shifting lights from the streets below. Overhead, above the clouds, the ring of solar satellites turns slowly in orbit, the lights on its underside blinking in sequence.

The person pulls the hood from their head, shaking out their ashy grey hair and breathing in deeply. The air is clear, clean, and rich in oxygen: the Västerström Corporation have made sure of that. Life is perfect on Paradise-90, the freest place in the galaxy; that's what all the travel advertisements say.

From this vantage point, Lalli can almost believe it. But it's not true; not for him, anyway.

"I've got eyes on you, Lalli, do you copy?" comes a familiar voice through the wireless headset that covers his ears.

Lalli touches his fingers to the receiver, opening the channel, and makes a small sound of affirmation. “Hnf.”

"You could just say _yes, Tuuri, I hear you_ ," says the voice on the other end, sounding slightly exasperated.

"Don't want to make too much noise," Lalli says at a near-whisper.

"I did a sweep for bugs on the roof. You're in the clear."

"Better to keep quiet," he tells her. "Can't risk getting caught again."

"Are you having second thoughts about this?" Tuuri asks, concerned. "We can abort the mission if you think it's too dangerous."

Lalli considers her question. Then he thinks about Onni, trapped in a holding cell. "No," he says.

"Good. Because I don't think we'll have another chance like this," she says. "The travel schedule I scraped from their server shows that Torolf Västerström is on a trip off-planet for the next three days. So that means tonight's our best night to sneak into the HQ while security is light, and grab that encryption key."

Lalli gives another grunt in affirmation. He steals one more breath of freedom before pulling the hood over his head.

"Ready," he tells her.

"Just a sec," Tuuri says. On the roof of an adjacent skyscraper, a small birdlike drone adjusts its position, zooming its camera in on where Lalli stands. "Oh, Lalli... your tail," says Tuuri.

Lalli's tail is thin, flexible, and tufted with grey hair at the tip. With a quiet sigh, he begrudgingly tucks it in around his waist. He doesn't like keeping it hidden away, but Tuuri is right: if anyone sees it, it'll be a dead giveaway that Lalli is something a bit more than human.

"Two stories down, third window from the left," instructs Tuuri through the intercom. "I'll make sure it's unlocked for you."

Lalli identifies which window she's talking about. Out of a pocket in his hoodie, he extracts a length of threaded titanium wire, which he fastens to the inner lip of the roof and attaches to his belt loop. Aligning his body with the narrow gap between rooms, so as not to be seen from within the building, he carefully descends down the glassy edifice until he hangs just outside the entry point.

He peers through the window and into the room beyond. It's dark on the other side, and his sharp senses detect no movement. He reaches slender fingers up and feels for the latch. With a soft hiss, the window slides open horizontally. Lalli slips through the narrow gap and lands safely within.

Inside, the room is empty save for several large stacks of servers, covered in blinking lights. Tuuri immediately begins giving instructions.

"Okay, so if I can gain access here, I'll be able to mirror the system feed on my end and see everything their security sees, and modify as I see fit," Tuuri says. "You still have my data drive, right?"

Lalli pulls out the data stick and holds it delicately between his fingers. "Got it."

"See if you can find a receiver port on the array closest to the door."

Keeping to the shadows, Lalli stealthily moves towards the server block Tuuri indicated. He casts a wary glance towards the clear glass door, where light from the hallway shines through. He doesn't see any guards on patrol, so he steps into the light for just a moment, to try and locate the port where he can insert the drive. After a few moments of scanning, he spots it: just above eye level, there's a port that looks to be the right size.

As he's standing on his tip-toes to plug in the drive, he hears the sound of footsteps approaching. Instantly, he goes into fight-or-flight mode, leaving the data stick plugged in as he scurries away into darkness.

"Someone there?" A silhouette of a guard appears in the door, casting their shadow on the pool of light that spills into the server room. Lalli hears their heartbeat, feels the pressure of their curiosity start to intrude into his mind.

Tucked into the shadows, Lalli knots his fingers into the hair on either side of his face, screws his eyes shut, and thinks with intent: _There's nothing here. You didn't see anything. Move on already._

After a moment of tension, the shadow of the guard moves out of the doorway, and he hears footsteps disappearing down the hall. The pressure in his head dissipates and Lalli breathes a sigh of relief.

Over the headset, Tuuri pipes up, "Okay, I'm inside their security system! Good job over there." There's the sound of keys clicking from the other end, where Tuuri is holed up in front of her computer screens back at their home base. "I managed to get a more detailed map of this place, too. Let's see what we've got..."

Lalli waits in silence, listening to the sounds of Tuuri typing over the intercom. Cautiously, he opens his mind again to scan their surroundings. It's risky, he knows: the mindscape is a two-way link, and the wider he spreads his influence, the more likely he is to draw unwanted attention.

As he scans for mental activity, he detects the murmured thoughts of several guards, moving about as they patrol the floor. That's to be expected, after all. Based on their noise level, it sounds like there are fewer tonight than usual, which means Tuuri's intel was good and security is indeed lighter since Torolf Västerström is off-planet.

There's something else though, that captures Lalli's attention even as he tries to keep his mind blank: another mind, one with a more unique shape than the ordered, disciplined thoughts of the guards. It's... fuzzier, somehow, more chaotic, and _warm_ in a way that draws Lalli unconsciously towards it, like an open flame carelessly throwing off heat...

The mind suddenly responds, thrashing, and Lalli instantly snaps back into himself, eyes wide. _Whoops_ . That person _definitely_ noticed his probing; hopefully, whoever it was is less familiar with psychics and will just write off Lalli's mental intrusion as an uncanny feeling. Internally, he hears Onni's voice admonishing him for being sloppy, exposing himself like that. What kind of spy does that?

Well, hopefully he won't have to spy for anyone anymore, if this plan succeeds.

"Seriously? They just have it labeled _Key Room_? Talk about a security oversight. It's like these guys were begging us to steal it," Tuuri says, breaking the silence in Lalli's head. "Okay. So it's two rooms to the right and across the hall. I'll unlock the connecting doors, but I'll only do it one at a time so as to not raise too much suspicion."

"Okay," says Lalli, already moving towards the door into the next room. A thin lance of light spills into the server room through the door seam.

"Accessing cameras... okay. Room's empty. Looks like you're in the clear," Tuuri tells him. Lalli considers opening his mind to scan anyway, just to be sure, but after the last brush with that strange presence, he doesn't want to risk it. The light above the door turns green, and Lalli stealthily pushes it open and steps into the brightly lit room on the other side.

The place he finds himself in could not possibly be any more different from the server room. Lalli finds himself in a large, illuminated space, surrounded by greenery: broad, leafy ferns; reedy grasses gently waving in trickling water; twisting vines cascading up and over trellises; and thick-trunked trees, their boughs heavy with fresh fruit. Brilliant, full-spectrum lights hang from the ceiling overhead, and the room is hot and humid, with the soft hiss of sprinklers and the bubble of hydroponics a constant thrumming in the background.

"A greenhouse on the fortieth floor," Tuuri observes. "Those Västerströms _really_ like to show off how much money they've got, huh?"

Lalli doesn't respond, but stays low, pushing aside broad leaves and using the plants for cover. The whole interior-facing wall of the greenhouse is made of glass, which means that any guard who walks along the hallway could conceivably spot him, if they were sharp enough. This is why Lalli prefers to stick to the shadows if he can help it; although he has to admit, it does smell amazing in here.

"I guess it makes sense though. They can use the waste heat from the server blocks to keep it warm in here. And this high up, the amount of light that comes through the windows is way more than at ground level," Tuuri continues to ramble on about plants. Lalli chooses not to respond; he knows that once she gets fixated on something, there is little that anyone can say or do to deter her. "I wonder if they feed everyone in the building like this?"

"Tuuri, focus," Lalli reminds her.

"Oh! Right, right, sorry. It's just so interesting..." she says with a sigh. There's the sound of tapping on her keyboard again, as Lalli reaches the other side of the room and flattens his back against the wall.

"Oh-kay. Small problem. There's a guard in the next room," Tuuri says. "Looks like it's the break room. He's... making coffee? Yeah, he's just standing around, watching it brew. Doesn't he have something better to do?"

"Which way is he facing?"

"Towards you... he'll definitely see you if you come in through that door," Tuuri says. She makes the small sound she does when she's thinking. "Hm, Lalli, do you wanna do your, um, mind thingy to him?"

Lalli considers it. He could probably persuade the guard that there was something more interesting in another room; but then he remembers that other presence, the one that noticed him. He doesn't want to open up his head if he can avoid it. "Not now. Isn't there anything you can do?"

Tuuri makes a vague noise of disappointment, then begins typing again. After about half a minute, there's a hissing sound in the other room, followed by a shout and a string of curse words, which is then followed by pounding footsteps disappearing out the door and down the hall. Over the intercom, Tuuri cackles with laughter.

"What did you do?"

"Made the coffee machine explode on him," Tuuri says in between laughs. "It got all over his uniform-- he probably ran to the bathroom to clean it up." She takes several deep breaths and seems to regain her composure. "Nobody's there now, you're all clear."

Lalli responds in the affirmative and moves from the greenhouse into the break room. Sure enough, the remnants of the exploded coffee machine have left the wall, ceiling and floor spattered with dark flecks of liquid, pooling into the carpet. Other than the wreckage of the kitchenette, the rest of the room is fairly mundane: there's a TV screen with a game console beside it, some worn-out couches, and even a ping-pong table. Nothing that's a threat, but nothing they're looking for, either.

He touches the transceiver on his ear. "Where to next?"

"The key room's just across the hall from where you are," Tuuri says. "Make sure nobody's in the hallway, then make a break for it. I'll unlock the doors for you." She inhales deeply, and when she exhales, her breath sounds a bit shaky. "Keep in mind that I won't be able to see you, since my eyes are out here. So you're gonna have to tell me what you see, and I can direct you based on that."

"Got it." Lalli creeps up next to the doorway and peers down the hall. There's no sign of any guards, except for the trail of coffee-stained footprints disappearing off in the other direction. The room he can see through the glass door on the other side of the hallway is dark, offering no clues about what lies within. Again, Lalli considers doing a mental scan; but that would take time, which he knows is a limited resource. All things considered, the best course of action in this case would be heedlessly charging into the unknown. He can almost _feel_ Onni losing his head about it.

Lalli isn't Onni, though. When you're a genetically-engineered psychic super-spy, taking extreme risks is just part of the job.

The light above the door turns green, and Lalli immediately pushes it open and sprints for the door on the other side of the hallway. He rests his palms on the glass, but the light remains red. His heart pounds in his throat -- this is the _worst_ possible time for Tuuri's hacking to fail them. Under his breath, he hisses desperately, " _Tuuri! Open the door!!_ "

"Oh! Right, right, sorry," Tuuri apologizes hastily. The light turns green and the door slides open, and Lalli practically tumbles inside. As the door slides shut behind him, Lalli takes in deep gulps of air and wills his heart rate to return to normal.

As he regains his composure, he takes his surroundings, the slit pupils in his eyes widening to see better in low light. The Key Room is... not what he was expecting. There's a thick, plush carpet, for one thing. Posters on the walls. Books stacked on shelves. A computer desk and chair in one corner, a low table and TV and some old toys on the other side. And at the center of the room is a massive, four-poster bed with a canopy, stacked high with pillows. He'd expected some sort of high-security safe, not something that looks like... a child's bedroom?

Then there's a rustling sound, and one of the pillows drops off the bed and onto the floor. A human-shaped figure sits upright in the bed and looks straight at Lalli with curious blue eyes.

"Who's there?"

Lalli's stomach drops. He's not alone in here.

"Lalli? Do you copy? What do you see in there? Hello?!" comes Tuuri's voice, increasingly frantic over the receiver. But Lalli remains frozen, unwilling to move or make a sound as the person pushes aside the blankets and steps down on the floor with bare feet.

It's a boy, Lalli realizes -- or, closer to a grown man really; he seems about Lalli's age, a young adult. He has dark golden hair and soft, rounded features, with clear blue eyes. He's wearing a sleeping robe made of red silk, very expensive-looking. He hasn't taken his eyes off Lalli this entire time; the expression on his face is not one of fear, but curiosity, looking at Lalli the same way Lalli is told he sometimes stares at others, with a deep and unflinching gaze.

"It's you," the boy says. "From before."

It's at that moment that Lalli realizes something else. The presence he'd sensed, that warm and chaotic mind, belongs to this person. Once he notices, he can't stop noticing: this boy is psychically like an open book, or a building with every door swung wide, inviting all the elements in.

"I thought it was a dream," the boy continues, taking step after tentative step towards Lalli. "I mean, I _was_ dreaming. I was asleep, and then I... felt something. I saw you, or felt you I guess, and it shook me awake." His curious blue eyes search Lalli's features as if looking for answers.

Lalli can almost hear Onni's voice in the back of his head: _You're a spy! Above all else, don't let anybody see you!_ Yet he can't bring himself to move, or even flinch away as this boy draws closer step by step, until they are nearly an arm's length apart.

"Who _are_ you?" the boy asks.

Inside his earpiece, Tuuri is screaming: "Lalli! Answer me, Lalli, please!"

Instead of responding to her, he reaches up and switches the transceiver to silent.

Then it's just him and this boy, together in the dimly lit room. Despite the radio silence, and the lack of sound in this room, Lalli feels nearly deafened just by being near him. His mental impression is just that strong: a constant outpouring of emotions, curiosity and intensity tinged by a strange hint of desperation. Eventually, he lets his mind adjust to it, like immersing oneself in cold water, and the noise of this boy's thoughts reduces to a dull roar.

Lalli meets his gaze eye to eye and asks, "Where is the key?"

"I'm sorry?" The boy blinks at him, confused.

"The Key," Lalli repeats. "The encryption key. The one that controls the satellites. The map said this is the key room. So where is it?"

The boy shakes his head, slowly. "I-- I'm sorry. I don't know what you're talking about." He pauses, and gives a sigh. "Dad never really tells me about any of this stuff. I mean really, if I'm supposed to run this company someday, I should at least know more about what goes on, shouldn't I?" he rambles, apparently half to himself.

Something in his words catches Lalli's attention, and he peers more closely at the boy before him. There's something about him that's familiar: the golden hair, the square chin, bright blue eyes. He looks just like the face of Torolf Västerström that's plastered fifty feet high on billboards and the sides of skyscrapers.

That's when it clicks, and Lalli's jaw drops in disbelief. "The CEO of Västerström Industries," Lalli says. "You're his _son_?!"

In response, the boy gives a sudden laugh. There's not really humor in it, and it has a manic edge to it. "Guess that comes as a pretty big shock to you, huh? It figures, seeing as I'm nothing but an embarrassment to dear old Dad. He'd rather lock me up and forget I even exist." He kicks at a pillow that lays near his feet. "Not _my_ fault I'm such a disappointment. If he let me leave this tower, then maybe I could actually _do_ something with my life. Have some actual _friends_ , maybe. None of this 'when you're older, Emil' or 'it's for your own good, Emil' nonsense. I'm nearly twenty already! Isn't that old enough?!"

Lalli's head is spinning with all this new information, but he picks out one thing the boy said, homes in on it: "You're not allowed to leave?"

The boy -- Emil? -- shakes his head, messy golden hair flying all over. "Of course not," he says with another small, crazed giggle. "Why would I? The world out there is a mess, they say. Someone like me is just too important to let roam around freely. I could get abducted, or killed, or eaten by aliens or--" his eyes sharpen, and he looks at Lalli with a strange hunger that wasn't there before. " _You're_ from out there, aren't you?"

Lalli regards him warily. Technically, he isn't _from_ anywhere; Keuruu Labs' true location is top secret. His experience of the outside world of Paradise-90 is limited, too, by being a wanted fugitive. And he's never been off-planet; at least, not yet. If they managed to steal the encryption key to the satellites, then Tuuri's plan was to use it to barter with the authorities for their freedom. By holding the planet's entire energy source hostage, she was going to demand that they free Onni, and grant the three of them real passports and citizenship status, so that they could travel off-world and leave this bizarre, corrupt and artificial planetoid light-years behind them while they warped off together into the vast galaxy beyond.

Now, Lalli finds himself in the strange situation of, for the first time in his life, encountering someone who is possibly even more sheltered than himself.

"Yes," he responds simply. "I'm from outside."

Emil's eyes go wide, and Lalli can feel excitement pouring off him in waves. "What's it like? Is it dangerous? Do you need a mask to breathe out there?"

Lalli considers this. It's certainly dangerous for _him_ to go out in public. He can pass for an ordinary human at a distance, but up close, his genetic irregularities give him away. His eyes, with slit pupils instead of round ones, and their tendency to glow whenever he uses his psychic abilities. The darker patches of skin on his forehead, cheeks, and fingertips. His ears, which he covers up using specialized earphones most of the time. And then of course there's the tail.

For a minute, he imagines what it might be like if he wasn't created as a mutant. What it would be like to walk freely through the streets of the city, stroll through its many glittering parks, eat the strange sweets sold by street vendors that shift colors and pop against your tongue; to breathe in the clean, fresh air produced by the genetically-enhanced trees planted at every street corner; to look up at the arc of satellites in the sky and be able to believe, really believe, that all this human ingenuity and genius engineering has truly created a perfect utopia, the freest place in the universe.

He coughs, unexpectedly, and rubs his hand against his eye to clear up his temporarily blurred vision. Emil's brow furrows in concern.

"Are you okay?" he asks.

"I-it's fine," Lalli murmurs. He coughs again, and says more clearly, "Outside. It's... nice. Safe. The air is clean. Not dangerous." _For someone like you, anyway._

"...Oh," Emil says. He looks away from Lalli and down towards the floor. One hand curls into a fist, which trembles at his side. "So they lied to me."

"People do that," Lalli says. All his life, people have lied to him. Only Tuuri and Onni don't lie. And... this boy, too, he supposes.

"I just don't get it," Emil says. "Why? Why lock me up here, when the world down there is perfectly safe to explore? My dad practically owns half the planet... shouldn't he be able to share some of it with his own son?!"

Lalli looks at him, this strange boy, with his messy golden hair, expensive clothes, and extravagant living quarters, whose life could hardly be more different from Lalli's own experience as a genetic experiment raised in a laboratory. Lalli looks, really looks, and sees that through all these differences, Emil is like him in a way: born into this world for a singular purpose, shaped and controlled by forces beyond his comprehension. Lalli has managed to break free; but Emil is still trapped, like a bird in a gilded cage.

Emil notices his staring. He gives a small gasp. "Your eyes, they're glo--"

"Do you want to leave?" Lalli interrupts, cutting him off abruptly. He averts his eyes, which probably are unintentionally giving off light. Looking down at the floor, he repeats his question: "Do you want to get out of this tower?"

Emil hesitates. Lalli can't see the expression on his face, but he hears the sharp intake of breath, followed by a slow, measured exhale.

"...Yes," Emil says. "I do. I want to leave this place."

Lalli looks up at him again. There is a new expression on the boy's face now; one of hope, as he looks to Lalli like he's some kind of savior.

Lalli considers the situation that he's in. The mission, which was to steal the encryption key, is an abject failure: he's been discovered, his cover blown. But then he considers the broader goals in Tuuri's plan. It didn't _need_ to be the encryption key, did it? He just needed a bargaining chip; something that the Västerström Corporation would do anything to recover.

He looks at Emil, in all his striking resemblance to Torolf Västerström, and thinks that kidnapping the son of the CEO might just have the same desired effect.

"Okay," Lalli says. "But you're going to have to be quiet, and do exactly as I say from now on, got it?"

Emil nods, falling silent. Lalli reaches up to his transceiver and switches it back online.

"Tuuri," he says.

"Lalli! Thank the stars! The line went quiet, I thought something must have happened! What's going on over there? Did you get captured? I hope you weren't--"

"I found something," Lalli says, cutting her off.

"The key? Did you manage to steal it?"

"Not the key," Lalli says, and looks over his shoulder towards Emil, who is watching him closely, confusion and hope and nervous energy pouring off him. "Something else. Västerström's son."

"Torolf Västerström has a _son_?!" Tuuri exclaims in disbelief.

"Yes. Can you work with that?"

"I didn't plan on _kidnapping_ anyone--" Tuuri starts to protest.

"It's not that. He _wants_ to leave," Lalli interrupts. "They're keeping him locked up in here."

At that, Tuuri's demeanor changes. She makes a small thinking noise in the back of her throat. "Is that so? Hmm. I'll see what I can do. My extraction plan was for just you though, not two people. Though I suppose with some modifications..." The sound of keys clicking echoes up through the receiver. "This'll take me awhile. Get him to the roof, and I'll handle the rest. Think you can do that all on your own?"

"...Yes."

"Okay. I trust you, Lalli. You were made for this, after all. I'll see you on the other side," she tells him. "Tuuri, over and out." There's a beep, and the line goes dead.

Emil looks to Lalli in confusion. "Who was that you were talking to just now?"

"Backup," Lalli says. Then, because part of him wants to be honest with this boy for some reason, he adds, "She's my cousin. She'll get us out of here safely. We just need to get to the roof first."

"The roof? But that's off-limits," Emil says, then reflects on what he'd just said for a moment. "...Oh, right, I guess that doesn't matter to you."

"No," says Lalli. He glances at Emil. "Do you know the way there?"

"Sure, it's just down the hallway and up two flights of stairs. But I don't think the guards will just let you pass. They stop me every time I've tried."

 _Guards_ . Right. Now that he knows a bit more about Emil's situation, he mentally substitutes _guards_ with _jailers_. That one guard that Tuuri distracted will most likely have returned to his post by now. And an uninvited guest walking down the brightly-lit hallway with the CEO's precious son is sure to raise suspicion. The chances of climbing two floors and getting to the roof without being seen are slim; but Lalli has more than a few tricks left.

First things first. He closes his eyes and opens up his mind to scan the surrounding area once again. The instant he does, he's hit with a wave of heat energy like a slap to the face. He'd forgotten just how intense Emil's mental impression is. With great care, he forces his thoughts to disengage from the roaring fire beside him and lets his mind probe wander, picking up on flurries of mental activity surrounding them. Not far away are the disgruntled, grumbling thoughts of the guard Tuuri doused with coffee; past him, Lalli counts four, maybe five clusters of activity, on this floor and the one above.

He returns to himself and opens his eyes to find Emil staring at him again, his mouth hanging open.

"What is it?" Lalli asks, annoyed.

"Your eyes are glowing," Emil points out. "And you were doing that... _thing_ again, just like before. I could feel it in here," he says, and taps his forehead. "What _is_ that?"

"What did I tell you about being quiet? No more questions," Lalli snaps. Emil's jaw closes with the click of teeth. "Stay low and follow me."

They approach the door to the hallway. Peering through the glass, Lalli can see into the break room on the opposite side, where sure enough the guard has returned to his former post, newly clad in a fresh uniform. Lalli will have to make sure he isn't looking their way in order to escape down the hallway undetected. He opens his mind again, just enough to reach him, and sends the suggestion: _look out the window_.

He feels the command take hold, and obediently the guard turns away from the door to look towards the wide glass windows of the 40-story building, surveying the glittering city below and the arc of satellites up above. _Easy_ , Lalli thinks to himself. He grabs Emil's wrist and, without hesitation, pulls him out into the hallway.

Under the bright fluorescent lights, he feels exposed and uncomfortable. Emil trails behind him, bare feet scurrying across the marble floor in an effort to keep pace with Lalli's swift footsteps. They make it past the break room and hurry along the glass walls of the greenhouse. Green light filters through the leaves of the plants and splashes into the adjacent room. They cross the length of it, past the darkened server room, and arrive at a bend in the hallway.

Lalli flattens himself against the wall and Emil follows suit beside him. He subtly peeks around the corner to survey what awaits them beyond. The hallway dead-ends at an elevator; beside that is a closed door with a sign that indicates the entrance to the stairwell. Lalli breathes a small sigh of relief; they're nearly at their target. Just a few flights up those stairs, and they'll reach the roof and Tuuri's extraction.

Unfortunately, standing in between them and their freedom is another guard, posted just outside the elevator. Lalli curses in his head. There's nothing in his immediate vicinity to conveniently distract the guard's attention for them to sneak past; and trying to take her out would probably make too much noise. Besides, he wants to avoid as much bloodshed as he can this time. It will make bargaining for their freedom that much easier.

Time for plan B, then. He looks over at Emil, meets his eye, and nods. Emil looks at him, confused. Then Lalli grips tightly onto his arm and the two of them walk out into the hallway, in plain view.

The guard notices them immediately, and straightens up. "Young Master Emil," she says, looking surprised. "What are you doing out of your room at this hour? And--" her gaze falls on Lalli, and her eyes widen. "Who is _that_ with you?!"

"He's-- my guest," Emil stutters out. "Please, don't--"

"Guests aren't allowed up here. You know that," the guard says, her hand already reaching for the laser pistol that hangs on her hip. Lalli sees it, and springs into action at once.

Swift as a whisper, he extracts his knife out of its sheath hidden up his sleeve, and grabs Emil, holding his arms behind his back. He holds the knife up against Emil's exposed neck, its sharp edge glowing with charged particles.

"Wh-wha--??" Emil looks towards Lalli, panic now in his eyes.

"Don't move another inch," Lalli hisses, making eye contact with the guard. "Or else he dies." Emil gulps in fear, his adam's apple bobbing just below the blade of the knife.

The guard stares at them, paralyzed, seemingly unsure of what to do. Lalli moves them towards the staircase, one step, then another.

"I won't hurt him, as long as you let us through," Lalli continues. He jerks his chin towards the closed entrance to the stairwell. "Open that door."

Obediently, the guard approaches the panel beside the door, and presses her hand against it. The light above the door turns green, and Lalli sidesteps towards it, holding Emil at knifepoint while not breaking eye contact with the guard. Only once they're through the threshold into the stairwell and the door swings shut behind them does he release Emil, who stumbles away and looks up at Lalli, a new fear in his eyes:

"What _was_ that?!" he asks, gasping. He brushes fingers up against his neck where Lalli had held the knife to it. "That was-- you just--"

"Be _quiet_ ," Lalli hisses at him. Emil's eyes glance towards the knife still in his hand; with a sigh, he powers it down and re-sheathes it in his sleeve.

"I-- I thought you were on my side," Emil says, hurt and betrayal in his voice.

"I _am_ ," Lalli responds. "I wasn't going to actually hurt you. I just needed to get past the guard."

Emil shakes his head. "No... no, this-- this is a kidnapping, isn't it? You're -- I'm just your hostage. You're taking me so you can extort my dad, aren't you?"

Lalli raises an eyebrow, as if to say, _no, duh, what did you think this was?_ But then he sees Emil shrink further back, panic and fear in his eyes, and heaves a regretful sigh.

"Look," Lalli says. "Do you want to get out of here, or not?"

Emil looks conflicted. He glances between Lalli, the stairs up to the roof, and the door that leads back to his living quarters. Then he gives a resigned sigh. "I... guess I still do."

"Then let's go already. That guard has probably already alerted the others. We need to move."

"O... okay," Emil says, voice still shaky. Then he plants his foot down. " _But._ You don't get to threaten me like that ever again. If you do, I'll run away."

Lalli gives a resigned sigh. "Okay," he says. "I won't threaten you again. Now let's move," he says, and offers his hand to Emil.

Emil looks at his hand warily, but doesn't take it. There's a new expression in his eyes, a cautious hesitation in the way he looks at Lalli. Maybe threatening him _was_ a mistake. But Lalli has got more pressing matters to deal with. His heightened hearing picks up the sound of running footsteps approaching them, on this floor and the one above. The guards are converging on their location; they need to run, _now_.

Lalli starts sprinting up the stairs, two at a time, and Emil follows a few steps behind him. He can feel the guards approaching; their surprise, anger, and determination to recapture Emil, and probably kill Lalli, if they can. But he's not going to let them. They pass the landing to the uppermost floor, the penthouse, and suddenly the lights in the stairwell flip to a dull red as an alarm starts to blare throughout the tower. Down below, he hears footsteps and a guard shouting:

"After them! He has the key!"

Lalli ignores this, and continues sprinting until they reach a door at the very top, labeled ROOF ACCESS. He tries the handle, but naturally finds it locked. Not a problem; with a flick of his wrist, the knife appears in his hand again. He powers up the blade and slides it in between the door and its frame, the bright-hot edge of the knife melting through the metal lock like butter. His work done, he re-sheathes the knife and kicks the door with his boot heel, sending it swinging wide open with a loud BANG.

Lalli dashes onto the rooftop of the tower with Emil following closely behind. As they break out into the open, the clear wind buffets Lalli, throwing the hood off his head and teasing through his silvery hair. He looks over towards Emil, and sees the other boy standing there, in his red silk pyjamas and bare feet, staring at the city below and the sky above them in awe.

 _That's right_ , Lalli thinks. _He's never been outside before_.

"I hadn't realized it was so _big_ ," Emil says, looking up at the ring of satellites slowly turning across the sky. "I mean, I know that it powers the whole city -- the entire _planet_ \-- but... whoa."

Lalli almost wants to correct him -- Paradise-90 is a planet _oid_ , more like a moon than a proper planet, and the city is basically all there is on its surface. But there is something truly remarkable about the satellites, now that he thinks about it. Unlimited energy, harvested freely from starlight, enough to power the whole civilization, to maintain its artificial atmosphere and ecosystem, and to give rise to some of the greatest feats of engineering and science the galaxy has ever known.

Feats which include hybridizing human and ancient alien DNA to create a new form of life, with powers and abilities beyond the limits of humankind...

Lalli can't afford to get distracted. He casts his gaze around for any sign of Tuuri's extraction plan. Normally, she would send her personal drone to give Lalli a lift. With his slim frame and unnaturally lightweight yet sturdy bones, it's capable of lifting him, and only him; that was how he got to the roof in the first place. But now, with two of them -- and Emil considerably more solid in build -- there was no way that method was going to work. But Tuuri said she'd have something. She always did.

Still, as Lalli searches, he finds no sign of her anywhere on the roof. Anxiety starts to set in; they're cornered here. He glances off the edge of the roof, to the place where his titanium wire dangles over the edge. Would he need to rappel down the entire length of the building while carrying Emil? He's strong, sure, but he isn't _that_ strong. And given how he'd just threatened Emil's life, he doesn't think the sheltered son of a CEO would agree to such a dangerous maneuver. They were running out of options.

The door to the roof reopens with another loud bang, and guards begin to spill out. Reflexively, Lalli grabs onto Emil's wrist, positioning himself behind Emil so as to not be such an obvious target. As he does, he gives Emil's wrist a squeeze, and sends a mental suggestion: _Relax, it'll be alright._

Emil flinches, looks at Lalli over his shoulder. He's breathing hard, the air shuddering out of his lungs. The guards fan out around them, far greater in number than the five or six Lalli first identified; there must be at least fifteen or twenty of them now. Many are brandishing laser pistols, with the dots of their sights trained on the two young men standing huddled together on the rooftop. For a moment, the howling wind is the only audible sound.

Then the woman guard from before steps forward, raising her pistol to eye level and pointing it at Lalli. "Unhand the Young Master," she orders. "There's nowhere to run. We have you surrounded."

"N-no!" comes a shout which breaks the silence. Surprised, Lalli looks over at Emil, who stands firm and resolute, his body blocking the pistol sights from reaching Lalli. He glances over his shoulder and meets Lalli's eye for just a moment, before he looks back out at the gathered swarm of guards. "You can't keep me locked up in this tower any longer. I'm getting out of here!"

"Young Master," she says, and lowers her pistol a few inches. "Surely you must know that's forbidden. Västerström Industries' success relies on your continued safety and well-being."

"Oh, yeah? Then why have you been lying to me this whole time?!" Emil stomps his foot. "You told me this planet was unsafe, that breathing the air would make me sick. But that was just a lie! You've been lying to me my entire life, and I'm through with it!"

"Don't be unreasonable, now," the guard says, and takes another step towards them. "You've had everything you could ever want provided for you. All the latest in clothes and toys and games to keep you happy. The best food from all over the galaxy, delivered whenever you desire. We only want what's best for you, Emil." She tilts her pistol towards Lalli. "But this one... this street rat. Do you even know who he is? _What_ he is? He threatened your life, Emil. Do you even know his name?"

"I..." Emil's gaze flickers towards Lalli, who feels a lurch in his stomach. He is suddenly, keenly aware that this boy is the only thing right now preventing him from being filled with a dozen bullet holes. He _really_ shouldn't have threatened him earlier.

"If you won't step away from him, then we're going to have to separate you two by force," the guard says, and snaps her fingers.

Instantly the guards to either side of her begin advancing on them where they stand. Lalli knows with certainty that as soon as they manage to pull Emil away from him, he will be shot, point-blank. All his and Tuuri's dreams of freedom, for themselves and for Onni, will die here on this roof, unless he does something about it right now.

He has one last trick, although it's something he prefers not to do except in outright emergencies. This situation certainly qualifies, though. As the guards advance in on either side, he reaches up and lifts the headset off his ears, lowering it down around his neck.

His ears fan out into the wind, long and multi-pointed, with fine, whisker-like hairs that sense every tremor on the breeze, and every thought that rumbles through the minds of each person with them on the roof. Beside him, Emil is the closest and loudest, but his warm, unguarded mind could not feel more different than the cold duty of the many guards whose job it is to keep him under lock and key.

Lalli closes his eyes, and the mental map of his surroundings sharpens into clarity. He sees each of the guards converging on them as blue pinpricks of light, with himself and Emil as a reddish mass in the center. He draws in ambient psychic energy -- an easy task, given how Emil constantly flares it off like a star gone supernova -- and coalesces it into a single command, laden with as much power as he can force into it, before blasting it outwards into the mind of each and every guard that surrounds them on the roof:

 _GO. TO._ **_SLEEP._ **

The change that passes over the crowd is immediate. The guards' eyes roll back in their heads, and one by one their knees buckle and they collapse onto the metal roof. Moments later, a gentle snoring sound echoes from some of the fallen bodies.

Lalli snaps out of his mindspace back to reality and stumbles forward, gasping for breath, his heart pounding. He's never tried to take out that many people in one shot before; it'll likely be a while until he can use his abilities again. And he'll be hungry. He always is after over-using his powers.

As he nearly topples forward, he feels a warm hand on his shoulder, steadying him, preventing him from falling on his face. He looks up at Emil, who's regarding Lalli with an awestruck expression.

"You..." Emil says, before his words fail him completely, and he just stares at Lalli, speechless, as though seeing him for the first time ever. Lalli realizes that there can be no denying what he is now, what with his pointed ears, glowing eyes, and-- yep, his tail, which is now waving freely behind him. (It tends to have a mind of its own whenever Lalli uses his powers like this.)

Emil recovers a bit, and looks to the guards lying on the roof all around them. "What did you do to them?"

"Put them to sleep," Lalli says, as though it was obvious.

"I see that, but, like, are they gonna be okay?" Emil asks, his brow creased with worry. Lalli considers telling him off -- these people were his jailers, after all -- but then he considers the worried look on his face, and thinks, oh. These people have practically raised him. He might feel the same way towards them like Lalli used to feel towards the scientists at Keuruu Labs. When you're dependent on someone, attachment is inevitable, no matter their intentions for you.

"They will be fine," Lalli tells him. "They should not sleep for much longer than a day." He'd been careful of that, to spread it out evenly among the larger group. If any one of them had received the entire force of his psychic power, it might have wiped their mind entirely. But Lalli doesn't want to tell that to Emil.

"A whole _day_? Oh, man..." Emil's gaze flits nervously between the fallen guards and Lalli, as though he's only just now putting together how serious the situation he finds himself in. He kneels down to check that the nearest guard to them is still breathing; once satisfied that they are, he stands up, hands on hips, and fixes his gaze on Lalli again.

"You're... one of those... those hybrids," Emil says at last, gesturing to Lalli, his ears and tail and all the irregularities of him. "I read about it in a book once. It said they were trying to bring back extinct aliens by combining their genes with human DNA... but I thought they stopped those experiments twenty years ago."

Lalli doesn't reply, only swishes his tail back and forth and looks at Emil mutely.

He begins to piece it together as he studies Lalli. "Twenty years... so... that would make you around my age, I guess," Emil says.

"Hrmf." Lalli grunts, and turns away from Emil. He's not reacting in disgust, exactly, or trying to attack Lalli, which is a far better response than most people have. But his fascinated, searching gaze is yet another reminder that Lalli is different, that he'll never fit in, as long as he's on this planet anyway...

"It's okay, I get it," says Emil. "I know why you didn't want to show that stuff to me at first. I'm used to those kinds of secrets," he says, and shuffles his feet nervously. "There's something else I didn't tell you before--"

Lalli's ears suddenly perk up, detecting a new sound that's approaching their location. He abruptly turns away from Emil and crosses to the other side of the roof, towards the approaching sound of a high-pitched mechanical whirr.

"I'm-- hey, I wasn't done talking!" protests Emil, but then he trails off as the smooth black shape of a hovercraft rises up over the edge of the tower and alights on the roof. A door slides smoothly open in its chassis, and then a young woman with fluffy hair pokes her head out before leaping down onto the roof.

"Tuuri," exclaims Lalli with relief.

"Lalli! You're safe! Good," Tuuri says. "Sorry it took me so long. It's tricky to find the exact right kind of hovercraft I know how to hotwire..." she looks over Lalli's shoulder, at the bodies strewn across the rooftop, and at Emil, who's standing there looking confused. "Wow. You really went all out, huh. Is that him? The CEO's son?"

Emil approaches, a bit nervously. He offers out his hand for her to shake. "Emil Västerström."

Tuuri takes his hand. "Nice to meet you! I'm Tuuri, and this here's my cousin, Lalli." At Emil's look of surprise, Tuuri frowns. "He... didn't introduce himself to you, did he?"

"Not really," Emil says, shaking his head.

"Well, introductions can wait. You'd better get inside," Tuuri tells them, and gestures to the craft behind her. "We won't stay under the radar for long. Once they realize we've got Västerström's son, I'm sure they'll send every enforcer in the whole city on our tail." Despite the dire situation, she grins. "You boys better hold on tight. This is gonna be a bumpy ride."

Obediently, Emil climbs into the hovercraft. It's clearly only designed to seat two people at most, so when Lalli crawls in after him, they find themselves in a dark, cramped space full of knees and elbows. The backseat is covered with stacks of cardboard boxes, and smells of grease and sauce, almost like...

"... _Pizza?_ " Lalli asks, wrinkling his nose. He opens up one of the boxes in the back seat, and sure enough, finds a pizza inside of it that has long gone cold.

Tuuri climbs into the front seat and reaches into the wiring beneath the steering console to activate the overcraft again. "Like I said, I had to grab the first compatible hovercraft I could find. No complaining, especially since _you're_ the one who had the bright idea to abduct the CEO's son, rather than the encryption key I told you to find."

"Mmfffh," Lalli responds, his mouth already full of pizza. The hovercraft lifts up off the rooftop, and rapidly accelerates to faster-than-legal speeds as Tuuri descends towards the traffic below. Behind them, the Västerström tower is illuminated in red, emergency sirens blaring loud enough for the entire city to take notice.

Emil grips tightly on to whatever handholds he can find inside the tiny pizza-delivery craft. "About that," he says as the hovercraft shudders, causing his teeth to vibrate together and pizza boxes to topple over onto the floor. "I was trying to say earlier, before-- before she arrived," he says, gesturing towards Tuuri. "I wasn't telling the truth before. When you asked me where the encryption key is. I knew what you were talking about. Where it is."

" _What?!_ " Tuuri asks, swerving the craft and sending everybody in the back seat crashing up against each other. A piece of cold pizza imprints itself against Emil's face, before it's plucked away and swiftly eaten by Lalli. "Why didn't you say so earlier?"

"Because... I didn't know you. I guess I still don't. But I thought you might have been, like, working for one of my Dad's competitor companies," Emil says. "You might've been trying to bring down all of the Västerström Corporation. But, as soon as I saw your ears--" He looks over towards Lalli. "I knew that you couldn't be working for anyone like that. You guys are in it for yourselves... right?"

There's a moment of silence. Tuuri tightens her fingers around the grip of the steering console. After a pause, she sighs. "...Yep. We're free agents," she says. "We don't answer to anybody. Not anymore."

"That's... good to hear, because there's something I should tell you," Emil says slowly. He takes a deep breath. " _I'm_ the key."

"You're WHAT?!"

"I'm the key," Emil repeats. "It's... tied to me. My body, specifically. My fingerprints, my voice, my eye retinas, my DNA... _that's_ the encryption code that the satellites use," he explains. "That's why my Dad never let me leave our tower. If anyone has that, then they could bring down the whole system, if they wanted to."

"So, let me get this straight..." Tuuri frowns. "Your body... is the one thing that can control the entire _planet?!_ "

"Yeah," says Emil, "basically."

In response, Tuuri starts to laugh uncontrollably, the sound filling the cabin of the aircraft, high-pitched and with a slightly crazed edge to it. Her laughter turns to hiccups, and when she finally regains control of herself, she wipes tears out of the corners of her eyes and says, "I can't believe it. The three of us must be either the luckiest or unluckiest bastards to ever have been born on this planet."

Lalli looks up and, through a mouthful of pizza, says, "I thought you _wanted_ me to steal the key, though."

"Yeah, but this -- _him_ \-- this is so much more complicated. And messy. I guess these things always are."

"So," says Lalli, "Where are we going next?"

"I don't know," Tuuri says, honestly. "But we've got a lot more distance to put between us and them before dawn." She punches the accelerator, and the hovercraft zooms forward.

So they press on, the little craft speeding into the night, carrying the hacker, the mutant, and the scion onwards through the planet-sized city towards an uncertain future, letting the flashing lights and sirens disappear behind them in the rear view mirror.

**END**

**Author's Note:**

> The premise of this fic was inspired by the inimitable [ Windy City Blues](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4964401/chapters/11400241) by SectoBoss (but only insofar as 'Lalli and Emil do a heist').


End file.
